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Oh, I’ll just bet he was.
I nodded, convinced even more than ever that Soren had been behind Brentley’s stomach ailment so he could secure himself a valuable Mandalay bride. The suspicion made me despise the dick even more for thinking of my one true love as if she were nothing but a prized possession, instead of a real human.
Glancing toward Brentley, I murmured, “So, you’re saying that if you’d only watched what you’d eaten, Sir Soren—not you—could be engaged to my sister at this very moment?” Because if Brentley had wed Vienne instead, then Soren would no doubt be the most available bachelor left in the family for Caulder to marry off to Allera.
Brentley laughed. “I hadn’t thought of that, but yes, I believe you’re right.” He gave a smiling nod. “Isn’t it funny how things work out? I must say, though, I’m happier with this outcome.”
I scored him with a hard glance for implying that anyone—even my own sister—was preferable to wed than my one true love. “You find fault with Lady Vienne?”
My hand fisted. I’d probably break his nose if he said yes.
But no. He flushed and immediately fumbled to say, “What? N-no! Not at all. There’s nothing at all wrong with Vienne. She’s quite one of my favorite people, I swear. Kind, compassionate, calm, steady. Incredibly easy to talk to. But… I just… That is to say, she’s like a sister to me, while Princess Allera is so full of...life. You know? She stirs a passion in me.”
I stared at him a moment. I was supposed to be happy he preferred someone else to my one true love. I was supposed to be delighted he found my sister enchanting. But I could only feel insulted for Vienne’s sake. It seemed impossible that any man would not prefer her above any other.
Sniffing out my mood, I trotted ahead of Brentley, entering the outskirts of the town and taking in the ambiance of Village Mandalay. It was friendly. About as friendly and clean and n
ew as the Iron Castle. The chatter was loud, boisterous, and upbeat as merchants tried to sell their wares to the villagers. All the people seemed buoyant and in good spirits, not dragged down with any kind of oppression or poverty.
The air was temperate and quite comfortable, too. It didn’t possess the unbearable heat we’d experienced on the journey through the Vast Desert to reach the Iron Castle. This small place was like a whole other world locked away inside the Outer Realms. The kingdom within the sand, indeed. I decided that if Lady Vienne really was working in underhanded measures to keep this place running smoothly, then she was doing a damn fine job. She needed to stay exactly where she was to help preserve something so pure and healthy.
And though the very idea filled me with a sense of desolation because it told me I would therefore never have her for myself, it also made me proud of her accomplishments and more determined than ever to please her. She had a hard job ahead of her; the least I could do was ease her load with a reason for her to smile here and there.
It didn’t take me long to find the vendor for grumpackers. Louder than most of the other merchants, a barrel-chested man with thick butchers’ arms stood at the back of a wagon that overflowed with the strange blue fruit and hollered on about how fresh his stock was. I approached him, ready to get my purchase over with so I could return to the castle and be near my one true love again.
“How much?” I asked, prepared to pay anything.
Chapter 8
Urban
I had two bushels of grumpackers bought before Brentley found me again.
As I handed over my coin to pay for them, he shook his head. “Grumpackers? That’s what you came here after? You should’ve told me that was your goal before we left on our jaunt. There are plenty of them at the castle if you wanted some, you know. All you needed to do was ask; we would’ve supplied them for you. There was no need to travel all the way down here to procure them.”
I shrugged and refrained from explaining that they were supposed to be a gift, a gift I’d felt the pressing need to purchase with my own gain. I mean, if a man couldn’t claim his one true love and be with her in every way he dreamed possible, then the least he could do was buy all the presents he gave to her in secret from his personal funds instead of having them given to him first. Right?
Curious, I took one of the grumpackers from its basket and studied the odd thing. “I wanted to explore the area, anyway,” I said aloud to Brentley, setting the grumpacker back on the pile. “Get a feel for the area.” And now that I knew how important this place was to my one true love, the explanation was actually becoming true. This was her land, her people, her passion. Thus, I wanted to know as much about it as I wanted to know about her.
My explanation seemed to appease Brentley. He nodded and made a sound of understanding from the back of this throat.
After tying the baskets to either side of my horse’s saddle, I climbed on and started out of the village, Brentley tagging along like an eager kind of shadow.
“So, selling clear rock is how Donnelly built its wealth, huh?” I asked as we meandered back toward the castle.
“It is.” The portly prince’s chest puffed with pride. “We’ve been very fortunate with it.”
I nodded. “I must admit, it’s pretty impressive stuff. I’ve always wondered how it was made.”
“Oh.” Brentley’s grin fell before he scratched his temple. “You know, I’m not rightly sure. They use the sand somehow.”
“Ah.” I arched an eyebrow. “So all that desert’s useful after all. Interesting. But how do they make it so solid? And transparent? And smooth?”
“Melt it, if I’m not mistaken,” was Brentley’s answer, as if he didn’t really care how clear rock was constructed, just as long as it kept him comfortable in his iron-plated castle.
But that answer had me titling my head curiously. “Melt it? Melt sand?” I gave a low whistle. “That would take more than your average campfire. How do you get an inferno going hot enough to melt sand?”
I’m not sure why I asked since I already knew he wouldn’t have an answer. Which he didn’t. “Well. The same way they get a fire hot enough to melt metal into swords and the like, I would expect.”
